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Thursday, February 20, 2014

Being Part of the Brit Babes by Lucy Felthouse

First, I want to say a huge thank you to
Wendi for having me here today. It’s great to be here!

For just under a year now, I’ve been part
of a group called The Brit Babes. We are eight British erotica and erotic
romance authors that have clubbed together for several purposes. One, to
promote all of us as a group, rather than just ourselves as individual authors.
Two, to have a street team that reads, reviews and promotes all of our books.
Three, to stand out from the crowd and establish a benchmark for quality. Four,
because we’re good friends and it’s nice to have seven other women to rant
with, exchange ideas with, ask favours of, and so on.

We’ve just added another purpose to our
growing list. On Valentine’s Day, we released an anthology – Sexy Just Walked Into Town. It contains
stories from each Brit Babe, as well as some collaborations and some tales from
Babes which have more than one pen name. The book is available for free
everywhere we’re allowed to make it free—i.e. pretty much everywhere but
Amazon, where we’ve priced it as low as we’re allowed to. Fingers crossed
Amazon will make it free when it realises it’s not the cheapest retailer! The
idea is to give readers a taste of our work. They may have read some of The
Brit Babes’ work and not others, or none of us at all. So it’s a low-risk way
of readers checking out our writing, finding out if they like it and hopefully
going on to check out our websites and other books.

I edited and put together the anthology, so
I had the fun job of reading all the stories. And I’m not just saying this
because they’re my fellow Babes, but there are some seriously hot tales nestled
between the digital covers of Sexy Just
Walked Into Town; contemporary, BDSM, lesbian, gay, ménage, paranormal,
sporty, military, curvy chicks and more. So as well as being a great taster,
there’s also such a variety that there’s something in there for everyone.

So, what are you waiting for? Head over to
All Romance eBooks and Smashwords to grab your FREE copy today. It’ll be
rolling out to other retailers soon, just as soon as the information filters
through from Smashwords. And hey, if you want to spend a little cash and get it
on your Kindle, we won’t complain. Any proceeds we do make will go back into
our street team, to providing them with goodies, prizes and so on. So it’s all
for a good cause!

Happy Reading!

Lucy x

*****

Sexy Just Walked Into Town is a collection
of delicious erotic and romantic stories from the Brit Babes. These eight
British authors have put together a book of tales to tease and tantalise you,
each one a sample of the individual Babes’ voices and styles. You’ll find
contemporary, BDSM, same-sex loving, ménage a trois, paranormal, sporty,
military, Rubenesque and more. There’s something to suit everyone here
including a few Brit Babe collaborations.

Ranging from sweetly vanilla to
so-hot-it-will-blow-your-mind, the Brit Babes aim to please in every literary
fantasy department. Their heroes are strong, determined and soul-achingly
divine and their heroines sassy, sexy and not afraid to grab what they want.
Passion and pleasure is the name of the game, romance and raunch a top priority
and it all comes with a delightful sprinkle of kink.

With a whole host of awards, best-sellers
and accolades between them, the Babes just know you’ll find something in this
anthology that will keep you turning the pages and squirming on your seat.
Then, if you like what you read here, check out the individual authors’
websites to investigate their collection of published works. Also visit the
Brit Babes’ home on the web which acts as a library for the hundreds of books
published by them. Tell your friends, spread the word, because one thing you
can be sure of, is when the Brit Babes arrive, sexy has just walked into town!

Bonnie stifled a sigh. He was doing
it again. Staring at her, as he had been every day that week. She was on a
fortnight’s training course through work, the only one from her office who’d
been sent. As a result, she knew no one and ended up sitting alone in the
college’s cafeteria at lunchtimes. She’d had a couple of invites from kindly
people also on her course, but she’d turned them down. It wasn’t that she was
being rude or anti-social, she just hated people to see her eat. She was a big
girl—that was putting it politely—and when people saw her have a meal, she
could feel the judgement rolling off them in waves, the thoughts that she was
fat because she ate so much.

It wasn’t true.
About what she ate, that was. She was fat,
and there was no denying it. But it certainly wasn’t her doing. She’d been born
to large parents, and despite a healthy diet and plenty of exercise, she was
still overweight. All she ever managed to shift was a pound or two here and
there, and that was hardly noticeable, particularly on a woman her size. She
kept at it, though, resigned to being a larger lady, but determined not to get
any bigger.

Because she’d
always been big, she was used to the snide comments, the dirty and derisive
looks, the open stares. So it didn’t upset her any more, but she still got
irritated when people simply gawped at her. Surely one glance was enough for
them to ascertain that yes, she was a shapely girl, and then move on. In most
cases it was, particularly if she glared at the person in question. But not
with this guy. Bonnie was sure he was trying to be subtle, because he often
averted his gaze as she trained hers on him. But even if he’d looked away, she
could tell by the position of his head and body that he’d been peeking at her.
Again.

Now, on day
seven, she was almost at boiling point. What the hell was his problem? Had no
one ever told him it was rude to stare? She was on the verge of doing just
that.

Eating her lunch
was an unpleasant task, knowing she was being observed. If she hadn’t been so
damn hungry, she’d have left it. But she’d been running late that morning and
had committed that mortal sin—missing breakfast. So her chicken salad—with no
dressing—was absolutely necessary to avoid making herself feel ill, or passing
out, so she devoured every last morsel. She ate faster than she normally would,
not because she was being greedy, but because the sooner she finished eating,
the sooner she’d stop feeling so damn self-conscious about the guy across the
room watching her.

She decided to
give him one last chance. When she’d finished her lunch, she’d drink her carton
of apple juice, then sit for a few seconds, doing nothing. If he continued to
look at her, she was going to stomp over there and give him what for. If he
didn’t, then she’d carry on with life and do her best to forget about him and
his rudeness.

Deep down, she
knew she was going to have to go over and say something to him. After seven
days, he wasn’t going to suddenly amend his habits. She was just being a bit of
a wimp, really, hoping to find some way of getting out of confrontation,
because she didn’t like it, not one bit, and it was absolutely a last resort.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t think of a single other way of stopping him from
doing it. Perhaps she could put up a sign in front of her saying “Please stop
staring at me.” But if he couldn’t take the hint when she’d glared at him, he
wouldn’t take any notice of a piece of paper.

Several minutes
later, her salad was gone and she moved onto her drink. With a sinking feeling
in her gut, she saw he was just as interested in her now as he had been when
she’d been eating. Damn, confrontation it was then.

Draining the
carton, she gathered her plate, cutlery and other rubbish onto her tray, stood
up and slid it onto the rack nearest her. Then she returned to her table,
grabbed her bag, pulled in a deep breath through her nostrils and marched over
to the Peeping Tom. She slid out the chair opposite him and sat down on it.

“Can I help you?”
she asked. Now she was close to him, she couldn’t help noticing that, annoying
gawping habit aside, the guy was pretty cute. He had strawberry blond hair,
pale skin, eyebrows and eyelashes to match, startling blue eyes and full red
lips. Every time she’d seen him he’d been sitting at a table, so she had little
clue about his height or physique, but his face was a damn good start. He
looked about her age, too, mid-thirties. She chastised herself—she was meant to
be telling him off, not lusting over him!

“W—what do you
mean?” he replied, the blood draining from his face and making him even paler.

“I think you
know, Mister. I’ve been attending this college on a training course for seven
working days now, and on every single one of them, I’ve caught you staring at
me at lunchtime. And you haven’t even been subtle about it, either. You’ve
gawped openly and it’s doing my head in. Which is why I’ve come to find out
exactly what your problem is, and to ask you to please pack it in.”

“M—my problem?”

“Is it because
I’m fat? Haven’t you ever seen a fat person before? If you haven’t, you’ve led
a very sheltered life. And regardless of whether you have or not, hasn’t anyone
ever told you that it’s rude to stare?” She was getting into her stride now—as
much as she hated it, he’d driven her to this. She thought she’d kept the
volume of her voice pretty low, but apparently not enough, because they were
drawing stares from other tables nearby. But at least they had a valid reason
to look—not many people could resist checking out an argument or a fight.

“F—fat?” The
colour that had drained from his face came back, then heightened further and
further until he began to resemble a tomato. He clutched the edge of the table
so hard that his knuckles went white. “You’re not fat. Y—you’re beautiful.” He
dropped his gaze to the table then, and remained resolutely silent until Bonnie
spoke again, which was a good few seconds later, as what he’d said sunk in.

*****

Lucy Felthouse is a very busy woman! She
writes erotica and erotic romance in a variety of subgenres and pairings, and
has over 100 publications to her name, with many more in the pipeline. These
include several editions of Best Bondage Erotica, Best Women's Erotica 2013 and
Best Erotic Romance 2014. Another string to her bow is editing, and she has
edited and co-edited a number of anthologies, and also edits for a small publishing
house. She owns Erotica For All, and
is book editor for Cliterati. Find out
more at http://www.lucyfelthouse.co.uk.
Join her on Facebook
and Twitter, and subscribe to her
newsletter at: http://eepurl.com/gMQb9

As one of the lucky readers that are part of the Brit Babes Street Team Wendi I can tell you that it is totally fun! Great ladies that are as supportive of us readers as they are each other as writers!